[Reader-list] RTF (Right to Food) Articles - 15

[Rakesh Iyer]

Source: Frontline

Issue: *Volume 21 - Issue 05, February 28 - March 12, 2004*

Link: http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/fl2105/stories/20040312006102000.htm

Article:

*Driven to suicide *

PARVATHI MENON
*in Bangalore*


THERE was a time when life did indeed appear to shine briefly for Venkate
Gowda, a small peasant of Dasandoddi village of Mandya taluk in Karnataka.
That was six years ago when he was able to add an acre (0.4 hectare) to his
inheritance of two acres of land. He then started growing mulberry for
sericulture, thereby augmenting his earnings from agriculture.

This glow of relative prosperity was, however, short-lived, something that
four years of drought, together with the drying of water in his three
borewells and the stranglehold of high-interest private debts, effectively
ensured. Indeed, by the end of it all there was so little to feel good about
that Venkate Gowda, who had toiled stoically and unremittingly through the
better part of 65 years, decided that he could no longer face life. He
committed suicide by consuming poison, leaving a shattered family faced with
few livelihood options.

His 40-year old son, Narase Gowda, angry and embittered at the situation
which forced his father's death, decided to leave the village - he knew not
where - once his daughter finished her final school leaving examinations. He
had a debt of nearly Rs.40,000 to repay to private moneylenders, borrowed by
his father at the extortionist interest rate of 5 per cent a month. This was
in addition to a loan of Rs.25,000 to the Primary Land Development Bank in
his district. The family received no monetary compensation from the State
government for Venkate Gowda's suicide, as his land was registered in his
son's name.

Venkate Gowda may have been pushed to suicide by a set of compulsions that
were personal and that related to the specific circumstances of his life.
Nevertheless, his death is illustrative of a larger reality in Karnataka
where over 650 farmers, according to official statistics, have committed
suicide in the past 10 months, unable to cope with three successive years of
crop losses and mounting debts. As distraught families pick up the pieces
and shoulder new burdens, the economic problems that drove their
breadwinners to suicide have not gone away. Therefore, to claim, as the
governments at the Centre and in the State have been doing, that a climate
of economic vitality and hope has been created in the countryside is really
something of a cruel joke.

A small but important exercise that provided striking evidence of a
persistent and gnawing `feel-hungry' factor for the majority of the 1,877
households in Nandibevuru gram panchayat of Harapanahalli taluk in Davangere
district was recently held by the Right to Food Campaign. The coalition of
about 80 non-governmental organisations (NGOs) in Karnataka chose this gram
panchayat to conduct a "social audit" to monitor the implementation of nine
government food security schemes, as part of a series of such social audits
it has planned in the State. The audit provided valuable empirical evidence
of what there is an abundance of media writing on - the exclusion of the
poor from the public distribution system (PDS) and the serious leakages in
its implementation.

"For the last two years I have not received any provisions from the fair
price shop on my ration cards," said 26-year-old Lalithamma from Kongana
Hosuru village in her written and oral testimony in front of assembled
district officials at the two-day public hearing that followed the social
audit. "Despite my application to the district officials in June 2003,
nothing was done" she said. "Because we have no ration cards, we are totally
destitute" said 55-year old Gurukanthamma, who owns two acres of land, in
her submission. "Give us the Anytodaya card. There are seven families in my
village who are in extreme distress", she said.

In a letter to the Director of the Food and Civil Supplies Department in
Bangalore, 15 below poverty line (BPL)-category residents of Kongana Hosaru
complained of being denied provisions for two years by the local fair price
shop. "The ration shop owner says we have to get a new card which we applied
for but which we have not received. We do not get work for even Rs.10-15 a
day in our village," the letter said. It is in such a situation that the
State government has reduced food subsidies to Rs.170 crores in 2003-2004
from Rs.295 crores in 2000-2001. In its Medium Term Fiscal Plan, the State
government claimed success in weeding out "bogus ration cards" and in
reducing the number of ration cards from 62 lakhs to 42.7 lakhs.

At a convention on Federation of Women in Local Self-Government organised by
the Karnataka Women's Information and Resource Centre in Bangalore recently,
many issues of daily livelihood were discussed in the context of women's
leadership roles. "It is a difficult situation that most people face in my
gram panchayat," M. Nagamani, an elected gram panchayat member of Karatigi
in Gangavati taluk, Koppala district, told *Frontline*. "There are new
classifications for BPL families. If you have a TV, fan or cycle in your
home, then you are not considered poor. Nowadays, the `Bhyagyajyoti' light
connections that used to be free for poor homes are metered. These
connections are being cut, because people cannot afford to pay the bills. In
my village 40 to 45 families out of 100 have migrated in search of jobs,"
she said. "Despite these problems, we try to fight and do the best we can
from the limited resources of the panchayat. We may not be fully educated,
but we have enthusiasm," she added.

"There is no question that the quality of life in my own family has
deteriorated over the last three years," said Shakuntala, a former gram
panchayat member from Tikkutta gram panchayat of Bijapur Taluk in Bijapur
district. "There are nine people in my household. Although we have 18 acres
(7.8 ha) of land, three out of four borewells have failed, and we borrowed
heavily to dig them. We also had a ration card, and it was taken away
because we owned land. Life is miserable, and in our gram panchayat there
have already been around 10 suicides by poor farmers."

The impact of cumulative crop losses owing to three consecutive years of
inadequate rainfall has been the proximate reason for the agrarian crisis.
However, there have been droughts of even greater severity that have
affected Karnataka in the past, but none with consequences as serious as
this one. The impact of the drought has been devastating because of a series
of policy changes in agriculture that have weakened the ability of poor and
marginal rural populations to cope in adverse climatic conditions. Most of
the cases of suicide involved small farmers who were deeply in debt to
private moneylenders. The withdrawal of bank credit to the agricultural
sector, and to poor farmers in particular since the late 1990s is
well-documented. Nationalised banks have not opened any new branches in the
rural areas in the past five years, and rural branches have been shutting
down in this period. The Banking Service Recruitment Board (BSRB), set up
for recruitment in the clerical cadre in banks, was abolished by the
National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government, as were the posts of rural
development officers in rural branches. In March 2000, the total number of
rural banks in Karnataka was 2,250, a number which came down to 2,201 in
March 2002. The percentage of Agricultural advances in total advances from
banks decreased from 21.38 to 18.86 in the same period. This went up again
to 19.5 per cent in December 2002, but largely on account of corporate
agricultural loans.

"Easy access to institutional credit is the exclusive prerogative of the big
farmer, whereas the small farmers will have to depend upon private
creditors," observed M. Veerappa Moily, former Chief Minister of Karnataka
in a recent analysis of agricultural credit in Karnataka. "Most suicides are
by small farmers who owe between Rs.50,000 and Rs.70,000 to private
moneylenders, whereas their debt to banks or cooperative societies is
minimal. It is also a matter of concern that unlike former days, the poorer
farmers are struck off from the BPL category, thus becoming ineligible for
subsidised food. It is for these reasons that a single year of drought or
crisis can drive poor farmers into total desperation," he noted.

Preliminary conclusions from a survey conducted by the People's Democratic
Forum (PDF), People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL), and independent
researchers in Bangalore, of 43 families of suicide victims in 51 villages
in Kolar, Hassan, Mandya and Bangalore Rural districts reinforces media
findings on the causes for the suicides. High indebtedness to private
creditors was the primary reason for most suicides. In addition, drying of
borewells, failure of pumpsets, increase in the cost of production owing to
the lifting of subsidies on crucial agricultural inputs like electricity,
fertilizer, water and seeds, and the fall in the prices of agricultural
commodities, had greatly weakened the ability of farmers to meet the
challenge of drought. "How can India be shining when the small landholder
faces such a grim future?" asked V.S. Sreedhara, a Professor of English at
Vijaya College, Bangalore, who was a member of the team. "For every case of
a suicide death there are a hundred potential cases. What is clear is that
there will be no change in the agricultural scene in the years to come," he
said.

The lack of work in rural areas has been one of the most serious
consequences arising from drought and related pressures on agriculture. "The
drastic reduction in the number of workdays for anybody related to
agriculture in Karnataka has increased because of drought and the fall in
the prices of all agricultural commodities," said G.N. Nagaraj,
vice-president, Karnataka unit of the All India Agricultural Workers Union.
"Even prior to drought, there was a reduction in funding for rural
development - towards capital investment in agriculture, credit flow to
rural areas, and so on. In Karnataka, the mechanisation of public works,
which is taking place on a large scale, has further decreased rural
employment opportunities. This is resulting in large-scale migration. In
Bijapur district there are villages where more than 50 per cent of the
residents, including landholders owning up to 20 acres (8 ha), have migrated
in search of work," he said.